Ducks head for home with a win

Facing a challenge on the ice from the St. Louis Blues and serious pressure elsewhere from their chief competitors in the final pursuit of a Pacific Division title, the Ducks needed their stars to play as such Saturday night.

Did they ever.

Jean-Sebastien Giguere made two of his biggest saves of the season to get the Ducks to overtime and Scott Niedermayer set up Andy McDonald’s goal 25 seconds into it that gave Anaheim a dramatic 3-2 victory over the Blues at Scottrade Center.

As they head home with three consecutive victories to end a four-game trip, the Ducks (47-20-12) gained two critical points with three games remaining to stay four ahead of second-place Dallas, which won at Nashville.

The Ducks have 106 points to match Detroit for the most in the Western Conference. The Red Wings have one game in hand. Anaheim plays San Jose in its home finale Wednesday.

Ducks Coach Randy Carlyle called it a “monstrous” win.

“We still have three games left,” Carlyle said. “I don’t know what the point differential is now but it puts pressure on teams trying to catch us. They have to win their games.

“What we have to do is prepare ourselves for San Jose on Wednesday and our preparation starts now.”

With the scored tied, 2-2, the Ducks gained a late power play on Petr Cajanek’s hooking call. But their shoddy work with the man advantage put Giguere on the firing line.

Blues winger Radek Dvorak got behind the defense for a breakaway but Giguere coolly turned his try aside. Only 30 seconds later, Ducks defenseman Francois Beauchemin fell getting back to defend a potential two-on-one break.

Jamal Mayers and Jay McClement broke in on Giguere. Mayers made his move as he passed to McClement on the left flank, but Giguere got his right leg pad out to foil the shot.

“That doesn’t happen very often, fortunately,” said Giguere, who stopped 20 shots in all.

“It’s part of my job. Whatever situation we face in a game, you try to do your best. Sometimes it’s going to go in, sometimes you make the save.”

Carlyle credited his goalie and said those saves were the difference. Only David Backes and Lee Stempniak managed to beat Giguere.

“They’re big,” he said of the saves.

“It’s a tied hockey game and it kind of shifts momentum. It gave us a chance to get to overtime and we found a way to score [on] four on four.”

In overtime, the Ducks put away a scrappy Blues team that is much improved under former Kings coach Andy Murray. Niedermayer kept the puck in at the St. Louis blue line and flipped a nice lead pass toward a crashing McDonald, who backhanded it past Jason Bacashihua.

It was big, as Bacashihua was also a tough nut to crack, making 24 saves in a stellar performance.

“Scotty made a nice play, first of all, to keep it in the zone,” McDonald said. “He kind of jumped up and we had a short three-on-two with Teemu and I. He made a terrific play. Just kind of floated it in there to hit a spot and I just directed it in to the net.”

Said Niedermayer: “It was kind of a weird little play. I tried to keep the puck in as it got up on the boards. Mac sort of came up on it but he peeled away. I took a couple of steps and got on top of it. Mac gave me a big yell that he was going to go to the net and I just tried to get it to him.”

Niedermayer put the Ducks up in the first period with his 14th goal of the season to tie his career high, which he accomplished twice with New Jersey.

The two points Saturday give him 67 for the season, topping the 63 points he has in 2005-06.

In his two years with the Ducks, Niedermayer has established career-best point totals in each.

Giguere added to his career-high win total with his 36th victory and McDonald, who also had a power-play goal in the second period, is closing in 80 points after his 85-point breakout season a year ago.

“It’s important that those type of players get into their ‘A’ games as we step forward close to the playoffs,” Carlyle said.

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eric.stephens@latimes.com